Monday, April 9, 2007

As some of you know, I love cooking with hearts of palm. So, for my first participation on Weekend Herb Blogging – this time hosted by Anh - I decided to make a hearts of palm quiche.

I got the recipe from a Brazilian cookbook but the crust called for Crisco. I don’t like cooking with it. Call me silly, but I don’t even buy it.Instead, I made a delicious crust out of a Gordon Ramsey’s recipe that had been posted by Valentina.You see, Gordon’s recipe + Tina’s magic hands = perfection. :)

I had to adapt the amounts because my pan was a bit smaller than the required on the recipe. Next time I’ll add a bit more filling.

In the end, the quiche was so delicious I even had a piece at night, totally cold, and it still tasted good.

Make the crust: in a bowl, combine flour, butter and salt, mixing with your fingertips until crumbly. Add the beaten egg and 1 tablespoon ice water and mix a little more. Knead it a little, wrap in cling film and refrigerate for 20 minutes.

Pre-heat the oven to 190ºC/375ºF. Brush a 24cm quiche pan with removable bottom* with the olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough and line the pan with it.Cover it with a circle of baking paper or foil and fill with uncooked beans – the blind baking process.Bake for 20 minutes. Remove from the oven, remove the beans and the paper/foil and brush the crust with egg yolk. Bake for 5 minutes. Remove again from the oven and brush the crust again with egg yolk. Bake for 10-15 minutes or until golden.This process will prevent the filling from leaking.Remove from the oven. Keep the oven temperature at 190ºC/375ºF.

Make the filling: in a large frying pan, heat the butter over high heat. Add the onion and cook until lightly golden. Add the hearts of palm and salt and cook quickly. Remove from heat and add the parsley, mixing well.In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and add the cream. Mix well. Add this mixture to the hearts of palm and mix.Fill the baked quiche dough with this mixture and bake in a preheated oven (190ºC/375ºF) until firm.Unmold and serve immediately.

* I used a regular teflon pan and had no trouble ummolding the quiche.

26 comments:

Pat, how delicious. to me palm of heart spells Brazilian all over it. we love it so much as a nation, dont'we?!/ I love the idea of the softness of the filling and the pie crust.yum! great choice. Tina

Well call me silly too because I don't buy Crisco either. From the looks of your finished product, you didn't need it! I think the hearts of palm are a novel addition; thanks for the idea Patricia! I'm tagging it right now. :)

Pat, I know what you mean by not liking Crisco :D Me either... except in a few crust recipes, I replace 30 - 50% of it with butter, I notice the difference is tremendous (much better). Since I make pie only very occasionally, I think my body would be ok with this bad stuff.I have seen hearts of palm in one Asian store, will take a closer look next time. This quiche really sounds delicious to me!

I have never tasted heart of palm before. Really wanna try it out since this recipe is so tempting! I don't use Cisco either since it is not available in Australia. But I hear from other bloggers that I didn't miss out much!

I love hearts of palm. For a while here I could get them at Costco in a big jar for not too expensive of a price, but now I can only find them in the regular store, where they're much more expensive. I think they're just so delicious, and I think your idea of using them in quiche is a great one. P.S. I don't really make pie, but if I did, I'd never use Crisco.